


and face the sun

by krystian



Category: Hyper Light Drifter
Genre: Character Death Fix, Domestic Fluff, Families of Choice, Fluff, Mute Drifter (Hyper Light Drifter), Nonbinary Guardian (Hyper Light Drifter), Not Canon Compliant, Other, Post-Game(s), Recovery, a hint of blood, tiny bit of angst at the start
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-01
Updated: 2021-03-01
Packaged: 2021-03-13 22:40:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29783145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/krystian/pseuds/krystian
Summary: After the end, a revelation.The Drifter lives, unexpectedly. So does the Guardian. Maybe they can work with that.
Relationships: The Drifter/The Guardian (Hyper Light Drifter)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 4





	and face the sun

**Author's Note:**

> last installment. after that, i'll be gone, hopefully. 
> 
> Title is taken from Persona 3's [Burn My Dread](https://youtu.be/4pNDzL8w6XI) and my BGM was A Hat in Time's [Clocktowers Beneath the Sea](https://youtu.be/drT1uOViuz4)

A child’s laughter, tinkling and as clear as the crystals in the west, pale blue.

A second chance, perhaps. He isn’t quite sure. A third chance, a fourth, without the illness whittling away at him.

Drifter wakes in the middle of Central Town with the locals staring at him, his body battered and broken and bloody but still very much alive. He hadn’t expected to survive. Hadn’t taken any precautions. He doesn’t even remember much.

Warm sun on his skin, a blue sky above, the crown is gone, shattered in a million pieces. The locals are staring at him.

He braces his hands on the ground, tries to stand on wobbly legs that can’t support his weight, his companion bot chirps, nervously hovering around him, and then there’s cold metal pressing against his face where the face mask doesn’t cover his blue skin.

A commotion. The locals are staring at him. Someone's approaching, their cloak rustling, a cloak he’d worn a long time ago _(just that it can’t have been that long ago because he can still feel the fur through his gloves),_ despite the blood staining it, the blood that not even the perpetual rain in the Barren Hills had been able to wash off. Not his cloak anymore. Never his to begin with, perhaps.

Guardian kneels down beside him, which is a miracle in itself because he’d seen them die, he’d been there when they’d entrusted him with their story, their burdens, because a sorrow shared is a sorrow halved after all. He’d held their hand in his when they died, the only time he’d consciously let them touch him. A last, passing grace, the only thing he could do for them.

But they’re there, leaning over him. Not wearing their helmet. Concerned eyes gazing down at him. Worry. Their hands hover over his body, not quite touching, until he nods and closes his eyes, because he’s tired and the locals are staring and it’s making him uncomfortable.

Guardian and he don’t exchange any words when they carry him back into the house, shielding him from the locals’ relentless eyes, and lower him onto the bed. There’s nothing to say.

He’s asleep before they even pass the threshold.

* * *

It gets worse before it gets better. It always does.

Knowing that, however, is not very reassuring. Neither for him nor for Guardian.

Fever dreams, waking up in the middle of the night panting and drenched in sweat with Guardian resting on a chair next to the bed, wet cloth in their hands to cool off Drifter’s face now and then. Coughing. Lots and lots of coughing. A few specks of blood here and there, but Guardian says that’s because he has to heal, first.

His throat feels scratchy. It hurts. And then more sleeping, letting night turn into day, and day into night, twilight in between, Guardian at his side more often than not. A dreamless sleep, a ticking clock on the wall, showing the time even though his brain can never remember it, can’t differentiate between dusk and dawn.

A knock on the door.

He sleeps.

* * *

Waking up in a nearly soundless room again and again, windless nights as the moonlight melts the shadows away. His own ghostly shadow on the wall when he sits up, braces shaking arms against the soft mattress, Guardian sleeping on the chair, they are exhausted. Because of him.

His own ghostly shadow on the wall, pink eyes this time, like Judgement.

Judgement is gone. A nightmare?

He doesn’t have the energy to flinch.

He sleeps

* * *

And in his dreams is Judgement. A nightly dance of bleeding swords, fuchsia blood splattering on the ground, Judgement impaling him before he wakes with a gasp, hands flying to his beating heart, clutching at the shirt sticking to his chest, a reminder that he still lives, despite everything. Despite everything.

Guardian wiping his brow with the wet cloth, dark circles beneath their eyes. Loosening his cramped fingers from his shirt, calloused hands on his own, smooth skin, untouched by sunlight. Hushing him when he brings his hand up to ask them if Judgement is still alive.

He sleeps.

* * *

He doesn’t run when he once would have. Self-preservation. Fear. Dread.

None of that is reserved for Judgement.

Judgement is gone. He’s seen to that.

He wakes with dawn, birds chirping just outside the window. Guardian is sleeping on the chair, their fingers intertwined with his own.

* * *

Walking is hard, but that’s alright, he hadn’t expected it to be easy. He uses his sword as a make-shift crutch for the time being, and besides, Guardian is there, always around him should he stumble and fall. Watching his every step, to the kitchen and back before he has to rest again. They sit with him during mealtimes, read silently in the evening when he tries to translate the monoliths he had found along the way, the ones he’d neglected until now. They’re with him when they’re not helping to rebuild the town, the world. They’re with him.

Not talking, not pushing him to talk, Simply there. An anchor, calm and collected.

They rub soothing circles on his back when he coughs, they don’t mind when he pulls away from their touch. Sometimes they buy medicinal tea from the Apothecary. Tea with honey that’s supposedly good for the throat. The Apothecary always scrawls well-meaning words on the packaging, telling him how he should handle his cough.

He tries to walk again.

Guardian watches from their chair.

* * *

The town is voiceless, quiet. People tap their feet when he passes by them. Whatever Guardian had told them, it hadn’t changed their opinions on him. They begrudgingly accept him now, that’s all.

And in the middle of Central Town, a hole. Dark as the night, a merciless tomb, devouring moonlight. He steers clear of it.

* * *

He doesn’t go out with Guardian when they go to reclaim the Crystal Forest or the Lake or the Mountains. Not the Barren Hills, not yet anyway. It’s too soon for that. He just waits in Central Town. He’d like to go out, but his body isn’t strong enough yet. Might never fully recover from the toll Judgement took on his health.

Warm sunlight on his skin, his helmet on one of the lower shelves in the house. He doesn’t quite need it now, even though the townsfolk still stare whenever he passes by. That won’t change. No shadows looming above him that day as he sits on a white brick wall.

And then someone tugging at his cloak. Someone small. With a ball beneath their arm. “Are you going to play with me or what?” they ask, holding the ball out to him. Bossy.

He sighs, inclining his head. Looks up to watch the clouds pass by one last time before getting up, following the kid to the soccer field. The kid is already in position when he arrives, looking excited. You can’t say no to children. Guardian had told him that, once, in a passing conversation. You just can’t.

He limps to his own goal, positions himself. On the count of three. A whistle, cutting through the air. He dashes towards the ball, despite the stiffness in his legs, kicks it towards the kid who catches it with ease. Comes running at him.

When he steps into their way, tries to get the ball back, they knock him down. Soft grass against the back of his head. A whistle as they score a goal. Their purple face above them. “C’mon, you haven’t lost yet.”

Drifter summons all the strength in his upper body to push himself up, bracing his hands on the ground, but it’s no use. _[Sorry,]_ he types into the holographic keyboard, _[that’s it for today.]_

They frown at him. “That can’t seriously be it. We haven’t even started!” Then they plop down next to him, plucking out one blade of grass after the other. “But we can take a small break, if we have to, I mean. If you’ll play with me after that.”

He looks up at the clouds passing in front of the sun.

_[Of course.]_

* * *

He comes back from the soccer field bruises on his skin and dirt on his clothes, and Guardian fusses over him, asking him what had happened, if he is alright, if he needs anything.

He brushes off their worry and gives them a small smile, barely more than a bared teeth display.

Guardian stares at him, baffled.

* * *

Sometimes when he gets back in the evenings, when Guardian has come home and left already, to help out in the town or whatever it is they’re doing, there’s an arrangement of blue flowers on the table, as blue as his skin. Flowers from the Crystal Forest, obviously.

And always, always a note. Handwritten.

He treasures them as he treasures the cloaks of drifters long before him.

* * *

He still can’t walk properly. Doesn’t stop him from playing with the kid, as long as he takes enough breaks. Sometimes Guardian passes by the field, waving at them on their way to the Crystal Forest. The kid is always ecstatic.

Another sunny day. The kid had won. They’re just lying down on the grass, clouds passing above them. “Why don’t you talk?” the kid asks. “You can talk to me. I won’t even tell anyone.”

 _[I can’t,]_ he simply types out. The sun is blinding him, so he turns his head away. Listens to the sound of the nearby forest. A shadow out of the corners of his eyes, but it’s gone in an instant. The Jackal? Probably not.

“Why can’t you talk?” they press on, not yet satisfied. Children are never satisfied with the answers you give them, Guardian had told him that, too. Seems to be the truth.

Drifter sighs, turning his head towards the kid. They’re staring at him with big, curious eyes, twiddling the ball in their hands. There’s dirt in their hair where their cowl had slid down. _[I never was able to talk.]_

“Is that why you always type?”

He thought that had been self-explanatory. _[Yes.]_

That seems to shut them up for a few seconds. Then, “I don’t mind, y’know. That you don’t talk. It does kinda make you cool and mysterious.”

It elicits a chuckle from him. 

* * *

He sits together with Guardian in the evenings more often than not. Just drinking a cup of tea or listening to what Guardian had done that day. Sometimes he wishes he could go with them, see the progress they’re making with his own eyes, roam around for lost technology, but that’s simply not possible, so he has to content himself with listening to their stories and tales.

They’re in the kitchen, on opposite sides of the table. “How have you been lately? I noticed that you seem to spend less and less time inside the house.” It’s not accusatory. Just curious. A hint of worry.

Taking a sip of his own tea, he stalls for time. Then he starts typing. _[I’ve been doing well. Thanks to you.]_

They nod at him. “It’s the least I could do.” A sigh. They set down their mug. “I just- I know what it’s like, being a drifter. That it’s hard to stay in one place for long. So if you want to go, all I am asking of you is for you to tell me when you do. Please.”

_I don’t want to wake up in an empty house, all on my own._

A pause as he plays with the mug in his hands. Turns it over, reads the inscription. A generic mug. _[Do you want me to go?]_

Guardian sighs again. “I don’t mind the company, if that’s what you’re asking.”

_[That’s not what I was asking.]_

Guardian tugs the cloak they never seem to take off tighter around themselves. A keepsake? “You’re welcome to stay here for as long as you’d like.”

_[Then I’ll take you up on your offer.]_

They seem a little surprised, although there is a small smile forming on their face, lopsided. “Alright, then. I’ll be looking forward to that.”

His bot only chirps in response.

* * *

“You were a lot cooler before,” the kid complains when he’s completely out of breath once again. They nudge his arm away to sit down next to him, placing the ball on his chest and watching as it rolls off. 

He tries his best at a shrug but fails miserably.

“What did you even do down there?” There’s curiosity hidden behind their accusatory words, as if he chose to go fight Judgement on his own.

 _[I saved the world,]_ he says, mainly because no one is going to believe a child’s words.

They gasp softly, dark eyes peering down at him. “Wait, really? From what? And what was it like?”

He thinks about that for a moment before spreading out his arms. The grass tickles on his skin, but it’s not uncomfortable. _[Dark. And scary.]_

The child snorts. “If I’d been there, I wouldn’t have been scared. And you wouldn’t have had to be scared, either. I’d have protected you.”

_[Of course.]_

But they aren’t even listening anymore, already chasing after the ball.

* * *

Deep, dark night. Shadows moving across the wall. Guardian’s soft, even breathing next to him in the bed they share out of necessity. Not that he would have it any other way. A hoarse voice, cutting through the dark. “I thought you were dead. That first moment, in the middle of the town.”

 _[I didn’t expect to come back.]_ He’d lowered the brightness of the holographic screen in advance. It softly illuminates their silhouettes, like silvery moonlight. He doesn’t say the _I thought you were dead, too_ or the _I saw you die._ That’s his secret, his burden to bear, and he’ll take it to his grave.

Rustling beside him as Guardian turns around to face him. Their face is unreadable in the half-dark. “I don’t remember much about what happened near the end,” they confess, their eyebrows drawn together as if in confusion.

 _[Me neither,]_ he lies. _[Must have been the Disease.]_

Guardian nods, still not fully convinced. “It must have been,” they echo. “I’m just glad. That you’re not dead, I mean.”

And after that, silence. The wind howling outside the window barely more than a whisper.

They wake with Guardian’s arm draped across their body, Drifter’s head pressed against their chest. The colours of dawn trickle through the window, one by one.

* * *

And as spring rolls around and flowers bloom, the little town he’s become used to calling _home_ flourishes. Travelers from both East and West, passing through, stopping for just a moment to look at what the merchants have to offer.

Sometimes he catches the kid tripping them up, only to disappear into the shadows again, leaving the travelers to wonder what had just happened when they pick themselves up again, brushing the dust off their clothes.

Sometimes he chuckles, a scratchy feeling inside his throat.

He visits the market, not really looking for anything because it’s always Guardian who brings home food and cooks for both of them – it feels too domestic for him. He knows the basics, obviously, but there’s something so fundamentally wrong about cooking in a kitchen, something that he can’t quite put his finger on. It feels too calm, almost a little phony, as if this is the calm before the storm. 

Shaking the feeling off, he keeps wandering around, listening to the merchants advertising their products when his eyes land on something he hadn’t seen in a very long time, something he hadn’t really expected to see, either.

The fruit is barely bigger than the palm of his hand, rather small and its colour weak, but it’s undoubtedly an orange, probably from around the Barren Hills, the first fruit of the season, perhaps. The first fruit since many seasons. 

He buys it, in the end, ungloved claws curling around the soft fruit as if it’s his most prized possession, a relic from times past. He brings it to the nearly empty field, his little shadow following him, always trailing a few feet behind, as if they think they’re fooling anyone, especially him.

Settling down on the soft grass, he starts peeling the orange, skilled, nimble claws cutting through its thick skin, motions he’d done all too often. And when the child sits down with him, curiously staring as he peels it, he shares it with them. A half for them and a half for him.

* * *

The child keeps following him, wherever he goes. “Teach me how to dash,” they say with that sort of authority only children can have. “I know you can do it, I saw you do it, so just teach me!”

He relents, in the end. Leads them back to the soccer field. Open spaces are better for training. Less chances of bumping into any walls. Or people.

And they aren’t a bad student. A little overzealous, perhaps, but not bad. They dash around the field as if they’d always done it, sometimes toppling over the wooden fence but always climbing back quickly. Soon enough, they’re running circles around him so fast that he can barely follow them with his eyes. But he doesn’t tell them that they have a natural talent. Their ego is already huge enough as is.

What the kid hadn’t expected, however, is the fatigue that comes with dashing, settling into one’s bones like a sort of altschmerz. Out of breath, they drop down to the ground next to them, pressing their small face in his cloak hard enough that both of them topple over. Then they yawn. “When I grow up, I wanna be a drifter. Like you,” they say, cuddling into his side and closing their eyes.

He doesn’t even get to respond before they’re already asleep, drooling on his chest.

Sighing, he rolls his eyes, shifting a little so he can run his claws through the hair peeking out from underneath their cowl.

* * *

Guardian finds them like that. Drifter’s legs have already fallen asleep from disuse, tingling slightly, and he starts from his doze when he hears Guardian’s soft chuckle, remembering the kid atop of him before he can dodge and wake the kid as well. Old habits die hard.

They incline their head above him. “Do you perhaps need a hand?”

He tries not to roll his eyes, pointing at the still drooling kid instead.

Guardian seems to understand. They lean down, picking up the child that doesn’t even stir from their deep slumber and setting it on their hip. “How about we go home? I’m finished for the day.”

_Home._

He doesn’t quite know when he’d last used that word. Perhaps a decade ago. _[Sure,]_ he says after a long stretch of silence, Guardian still holding the child.

They walk home together in comfortable silence, the child now drooling onto Guardian instead. It serves them right, for laughing at him.

* * *

The kid only wakes when dinner is ready, waiting on the table. It pads into the kitchen on naked feet, rubbing at their bleary eyes and taking a seat at the table as if that’s the most normal thing in the world. “What were you talking about?” they ask, trying to grab the spoon but failing because they can’t quite reach it with their short arms.

 _[Grown-up stuff,]_ Drifter answers, handing them the spoon. _[You wouldn’t understand.]_

They frown at him, clinking their spoon against the bowl in disbelief. “’Course I understand. I’m almost grown up myself after all.” Then they turn to Guardian, scrutinizing them with their eyes. “Do you wanna play with me? After dinner?”

Guardian, who had been watching the interaction with an amused face until now, taps their index finger against their chin as if they actually have to think about it. “Oh, I don’t know. It’s pretty dark outside already. Are you sure you won’t get scared?”

The child frowns harder. “I’m not afraid of no dark. I already told him that.”

Drifter nods as if to back up their argument.

“And what about your parents?” Guardian asks instead. “Won’t they be worried?”

Rolling their eyes, the child concedes. “Fine,” they whine, dragging out the vowels. “What about tomorrow then?”

Guardian nods, and that seems to placate the child. Moonlight filters in through the window. Spoons clink against bowls. The child kicks their feet against the table’s legs.

It’s anything other than quiet, but Drifter doesn’t mind all that much.

* * *

After they’d brought the child home _(the mother hadn’t been worried – everyone in town knew Guardian after all, so she’d just thanked them with a soft smile, taking the child from Guardian and setting it on her hip_ ), Drifter and Guardian wander back. They’re not in a hurry; there’s nothing in Central Town that would willingly attack them and the night is young.

The moon shines above them, softly illuminating their surroundings. A light breeze sways the leaves of the trees around them. Other than that, silence.

“I’m glad you decided to stay,” Guardian says after a while. Their shoulders bump together in the darkness, more of a coincidence than anything else, really.

_[Me too.]_

Cicadas chirp; he’s healing along with the world.

The faint smell of spring, burning embers and oranges. Guardian’s warmth, the familiar weight of their cloak as they settle down on a brick wall and let their eyes wander.

And then a child’s laughter, tinkling and as warm as the sun on a summer day, not a single cloud in the sky.

**Author's Note:**

> idk why i like the soccer kid so much, i just think they're neat. and the way they turn their head when you score a goal is cute. and also, [Oranges](https://gladdestthing.com/poems/the-orange)
> 
> in any case, i'm so tired right now. i could sleep for an eternity. maybe i will.


End file.
